If it wasn’t the new 903bhp McLaren P1 that grabbed you by the thorax last week, then it was the new Enzo – sorry, LaFerrari – that did so, boasting even more power, even more barking performance and an even more heinous price tag to go with it.

Question is, though, do such cars have any kind of a point or meaning to them, beyond providing a means of alleviating boredom for the über-wealthy car enthusiast, or is that really all there is to them?

In most cases, I believe personally that there is a point to them, and that their existence can be justified quite easily. For several reasons.

One, in the case of the Ferrari and McLaren in particular, the technologies being pioneered in these cars will, there can be little doubt, make the cars of tomorrow safer, more efficient, faster (yes, probably) but also just better all round. And when I say the cars of tomorrow, I don’t mean the supercars of tomorrow – I mean the everyday cars in which the rest of us will mostly bumble about in.

Two, they will make the sports cars of tomorrow more affordable. What’s on the cutting edge today invariably costs a fortune to create, yes, but unless someone, somewhere ventures towards that edge and explores it, it will forever remain unattainable – and therefore way beyond expensive. But once the likes of Ferrari, Porsche and McLaren have pushed the boundaries at the extremes, everything else gets that little bit closer. And then, eventually, the man in the street will benefit.

Three, despite what some people may think, the idea of merely being 'into' exceedingly fast, obscenely expensive, deliciously loud, low and breathtakingly beautiful-looking cars is, for the most part, still fairly harmless. Some of us, in fact, still just like gawping at the things, because our very small brains are largely unaware of, and therefore mostly unperturbed by, the potential moral or geopolitical issues that they may arouse.

Four, they provide magazines like ours with some killer content. The new 950bhp Enzo may not be quite what’s required to ensure that world peace occurs any time soon, but as a car nut I can’t get enough of its 15.5sec 0-300km/h claim. And as a car journalist, I can’t wait to verify Maranello’s claims for the car, at Mach 3 on some deserted airfield in the middle of nowhere.

There are exceptions, of course. The Lamborghini Veneno strikes me as being little more than a gratuitous means of grabbing back some headlines from the others, without advancing the art of the road car one iota. Ultimately, it comes across as a rather cynical, spikey, vulgar-looking means of exploiting the faith of Lamborghini’s three richest, most loyal customers. That or else someone at Sant'Agata found a bin full of discarded bits of carbonfibre round the back of the factory just before the show, then decided to stick them together using red gaffer tape, while singing, “Anything they can do, we can do better…”

In the end, the current craze for hypercars is to be taken with a fairly large pinch of salt sometimes – of course it is. But it’s also a thing to celebrate, surely, as a car enthusiast.

After all, in 20 years' time the classic magazines will be writing about what happened at Geneva on 5 March 2013 over and over again. And already, that day will forever be referred to as yesterday.

They are ego boosts on a corporate scale. They hold little interest as far as I am concerned, but I recognise that designers, engineers, marketing, all want to showcase their talent, and if good comes out of them, then let this particular music play on.

Nope, no point,driven by the minority,little tech for the majority,maybe these cars keep them in business?,but really,in today's World the reall supercars/hypercars are.........super saloons, the M5,Alpina's and AMG Mercs, i'm sure most of you can name more.These cars after a few years come down within range of more of us as opposed to the above mentioned which never will,acceleration is the name of the game, Ferrari and Mclaren portray top speeds as irrelevant,and for me anyway,getting too 124mph in under 7 secs is plenty fast enough!,but, the fact remains,we never drive our cars regularly at top speed,we use the aceleration more,and with the advent of hybrid, a wee bit more grunt is available too,so, hypercars and the like?.....nice to look at, but ultimately,not really that important in todays society.

If you earn a £1 million plus a year, your hardly going to buy a Skoda, are you. Rafael Nadal, wears a $200k watch. Yes its mainly bling factor, but then what was the point of the Lamborghini Countach 40 years ago. These days I equate expensive cars with pieces of Jewelery. They have basically reached Le Mans style prototypes for the Road, and similar in price.

In the real world 950 horepower vs 906 horepower is totally irrelevant. It however speaks to our souls, our desire to forever go faster, higher...... I can hardly wait for the LaFerrari +1 or the P2....

The Ferrari is already sold out, all 500 of them, so it makes sense to the 500 who will get one, to the other 500 who would have wanted one but got there to late, and to the manufacturer, who will get the money plus the publicity and the aura that translates to the whole range. To the rest of us, we can't have one but it's great to look at, kind of like automotive p*rn.

As for the Veneno, it seems to me that Lambo is building a habit of making very limited edition, very expensive, very exotic cars based on existing tech, just to see how a new design language gets received. There is a fair bit of the Murcielago-based Reventón in the way the Aventador looks, so I would not be surprise if some language cues from the Veneno translated into future Lamborghini; if not the Gallardo replacement, then probably the Aventador replacement.

Manufacturers are being pushed to make cars to ever more stringent rules and regulations by governments. These hypercars are surely their way of showing imaginative solutions which will ultimately find their way down to something affordable for us mere mortals. Meanwhile there are folk who are willing and have the wherewithal to pick up the tab. Positive responses to today's and tomorrows' challenges while creating employment in the motor industry as a whole so win, win, all round.